Hiring Assets Can Become Liability ,If They Donot know How to use Computers  

Every office has few 'compuer-challenged' executives. Even though skilled in their core domains, these executives usurp other people's time and resources to address their own lack of IT skills. Sometime they can even cause major losses to their organisations. So are you hiring assets or liablilities? This a wake up call to businesses to take a look at their hiring strategies, their commitment to further train their staff, and to define at what point they need to fire or replace staffers. Listen to the common refrain from a number of beleaguered IT department personnal. According to Vishwajeet, manager IT, Higrade Computer Systems, http://www.higradeworld.com, "The technology team in any organisation does not directly earn for the company. Our first objective is to cut costs. However, one trouble spot for IT heads like me is the end user, who is technology illiterate and not even willing to learn. You have to understand the mindset of these users. Whenever there is a problem, I try and resolve their issues by giving assistance on the phone. However, until I actually go to their desk to tell them what's wrong, they fail to understand. It could be something as simple as opening a new web page. Today I am in a position where I am talking to more than 700 employees across our company's organisation. Though I know their problem, I cannot make them understand it." "Our Hr department never asks for It skills while the candidate is being interviewed for a non - IT job. For them it's a very trivial issue but for the IT department in any company, such employees are sores. I can even narrate silly incidents where they crib that the printer is not working, when there is no paper in it." says a distressed Navneet kumar, manager-IT , Adsenselover http://www.adsenselover.com. "In short, tabaah kar diya hai." he adds, which, when translated from Hindi, means 'a lamp of devastation. Kunal Kishore, Precision PR, recalls how he hired a media executive, impressed by her mass communications degree. However, they soon realised that she did not know how to work on things as simple as Microsoft Excel or access their local area network. "It was getting difficult for us to give her on the job IT training and we ended up wasting more time in addressing her lack of IT knowledge. We have learnt from this experience, and will make sure that the next time we hire candidates we ask about their IT skills."

Busineses are spending millions, and sometimes even more, on their IT hardware, software, and Infrastructure. Then they hire the best talent possible for their business. Yet very often, when the best computing resource meets the best HR resource, What it results in is chaos. An informal survey of businesses around the world show that few make the effort to check whether a candidate has the basic IT- skills required for the job. "A basic requirement for an organisation is a knowledge or relevant applications, the software and its use. For instance, for a sales team, knowledge of working with spreadsheets has become imperative; for marketing professionals knowledge of slide-presentation software is extremely important considering all the 'winning presentations' that are required to be make. " says Rajeev Katyal, senior vice president, RealestateGainer http://www.realestategainer.com .

Computers have become an integral parts of work place today. "Whatever the naute of your job might be, you do need to have a working knowledge of computers. Basic skills like word processing, spreadsheets, creating presentations and Internet use is a must for any kind of a role. Organisations insist on all employees being IT savvy today," says Rajiv Sanghi, vice president, Propertylinker, http://www.propertylinker.com.

Hiring Grounds "Companies are increasingly becoming IT-enabled and the Internet has become an integral part of every business. We casually ask candidates about their IT-savviness, which does not necessarily mean that they should be geeks. This is just to check their eagerness to learn and adopt technology. One question that we generally ask to judge a candidate's IT skills is. "Do you have a computer at home?" says Hitesh Sharma, CEO of HigradeSea, http://www.higradesea.com. But just having a computer at home is no proff that a candidate knows how to work on it as well. It could very well be a box, just eating up space at home, or a play-station for the kids. When push comes to shove, you would expect your professional staff to whip up a snazzy slide presentation for the 9am meeting, or to reveal how hidden costs reduce your profits and what price-adjustments are required, thanks to deft wizards and functions in spreadsheets, or even to use word processing to send personalised mails to , say a hundred dealers across India, in just five minutes.

What you don't want is high profile managers bullying their juniors and colleagues to help them with troubleshooting on their computers. A good rule-of-thumb is that if your MIS guy is always frustrated and harried, or you' ve noticed a high attrition rate in the MIS department, the chances are that you need to train your office computers for business. "Unless the job requires specific IT skills on accounting software, design software and others, we do not focus much on it. However, during the course of an interview, we judge a person's computer skills on the basis of their past eperience. For example, it we are hiring a marketing manager, we of course do not ask him about his comfort levels with MS Office", says Shikha Singh, consultant, FullhealthGuide, http://www.fullhealhguide.com/health.

"We ask them about their IT skills and how conversant they are with simple computer programs like word processing, spreadsheets and others. Our entire system runs on Microsoft's Navision ERP and so we also enquire if the applicant is aware of the technology. However, that's not a big issue as we eventually give them training. "Amitabh Nangia, director, HigradeSearch, http://www.higradesearch.com Navision is Microsoft's latest offering for Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP). Typical office applications have moved beyond just MSoffice and accounting packages like Tally. Now your employees need to know how to use a Content Management Systems (CMS), intranets, LANs, Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), and depending on your office, several vertical specific solutions like Radio Frequency Identity tags (RFID), digital signatures, and basic computer troubleshooting. So, how much training is 'enough'? "The training requirements of corporation include the induction to skill-based or technology based programs. Since IT usage is predominant in most organisations today, basic level programs are also conducted for specific sets of people within the organisation, "explains Rajiv Sharma, vice president, Higrade Ltd., http://www.higrade.in . the training can be done both at the client's site as well as in Higrade Institute, depending upon the client's reqirements, " he adds. How to Judge IT skills while recruiting: After hiring a highly quilifed marketing manager, you're surprised to discover that when asked to make a presentation, he immediately requests for assistance. Are you prepared to give him 24x7 IT assistance? If not, then here are skills you should evaluate before hiring someone. * Word processing, spreadsheet and presentation applications skills. * Understanding of computer terms and the basics of the operating system. * Internet browsing and e-mail management skills. * Filing and file-systems and other forms of back-up. * Burning data CDs. * Communication and collaboration tools like Skype. * Skills with office networks, intranet, access dashboards, MIS systems and such. * RSS feeds. * Business Blogs * Applying security- pathes and updates to browsers, e-mail-clients, and operating system components. * Handling and regularly updating antivirus software. * Ability to learn new, business software. Please call your HR department and the MIS department for a joint meeting with you. From evaluating the existing skills of your employees, listening to the unvoiced grievances of the MIS staff, defining a policy for selecting new candidates, to identifying the possible need for outsourced IT training, there's a lot to be done. Beyond your impressive IT infrastructure, manpower was, is, and will always remain the true asset of your company.

Hardeep singh is the Publisher of the article, You can get more information by visiting his website at; http://www.higradesea.com http://www.moneymymoney.com http://www.yogaseekers.com http://www.higradesearch.com http://www.fullhealthguide.com or http://www.fullhealthguide.com/health Download 5 Free New Adsense Ready websites completely Free. Just subscribe to this website's Newsletter CLICK HERE NOW http://www.higradesea.com Download Instantly after subscription & you can see demo sites also before download.

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Hardeep singh is the Publisher of the article http://www.higradesea.com http://www.moneymymoney.com http://www.yogaseekers.com http://www.higradesearch.com http://www.fullhealthguide.com or http://www.fullhealthguide.com/health Download 5 Free New Adsense Ready websites completely Free. Just subscribe to this website's Newsletter CLICK HERE NOW http://www.higradesea.com